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Warrington Athletics Club pair Julie Hicken and Steve Watmough each bagged two team medals for Great Britain and Northern Ireland in the World Masters Indoor, 10K and Cross Country Championships held over eight days in Gainesville. Both of Hicken’s medals came on the final day on the indoor track at the Alachua County Sports and Events Center. Running the first leg, she laid the perfect platform by handing over in first place as the GB women’s aged 60-64 team won gold in the 4x200m, with Australia and USA taking the other medal places.
And she backed that up in her final event, again running the opening leg as GB’s mixed 60-64 4x200m team claimed silver behind USA, with Canada taking third. Earlier in the week, Hicken came through heats and semi-finals to contest the finals of both the women’s 60m and 200m finals in the 60-64 age group. Her times were consistent throughout and she finished fourth in the 60m showdown in 9.
16secs, narrowly missing out on her own club record. And she was fourth again in the 200m final, clocking 30.42secs on the dip and missing out on a medal by 4/1000ths of a second.
On the opening day, Watmough won a team bronze in the 55-69 years age group of the cross country. He finished 19th overall and fifth in the 60-64 age group. After a 17th place finish on the track in the 3000m in 10mins 45.
28secs two days later, he tackled his third different terrain of the championships when he competed in the 10K road race on the penultimate day. He was 31st overall with 37mins 40secs to finish fourth in his age group, helping the GB team to silver medals. Warrington Athletics Club held their awards night on Friday for the year from October 2023 to September 2024.
Hurdlers Lewis Shaw and Olivia Crawford, coached by Neal Petley, were unveiled as the male and female athlete of the year winners. Coach of the year, winning the Neville Jones Memorial prize, went to Anne Gregory. Anne Gregory (Image: Contributed) Awards for international representation either for Great Britain or England were made to Lewis Shaw (England Schools), James Horman (England Masters), Dave Gill (England Masters and Great Britain Fire Service), Georgina Walker (Great Britain Masters), Steve Watmough (Great Britain and England Masters) and Julie Hicken (Great Britain and England Masters).
‘WAC Legend’ awards for long service to the club were presented to Sue Makin, Helen Darbyshire, Frank Gladman, Julie Hicken and Andy Clare. Meanwhile, eight awards were collected by Warrington Athletics Club runners at the 2024/25 Manchester Area Cross Country League presentation night. Emilia Gandy won the bronze medal for the overall under 11s girls league and was a member of the team, along with Ivy Davidson and Ava Hardman, which also won the bronze medals.
In the under 11s boys, Alex Farrell and Alfie Furnival received the silver and bronze medals and also won the silver medals in the team with Tristan Tickle. Warrington Athletics Club's under 11s boys at the Manchester Area Cross Country League awards presentation staged at Wilmslow Rugby Club (Image: Contributed) Steve Watmough won the over 60s men’s age group gold, while Claire Andrew won the silver medal in the women’s over 45s age group. A surprise came for Dave Spencer when he received a Special Merit Award for his contribution over many years and in all types of weather.
Three Warrington runners headed to the Blackpool Were & Fylde AC Winter Warmer track meeting on Sunday. In the under 20s men’s 110m hurdles, Lewis Shaw had his first run over the under 20s height hurdles winning in 15.3secs before heading off for warm weather training.
Lewis Shaw (Image: Contributed) Luis and Ivy Davidson (Image: Contributed) Siblings also competed. In the under 11s girls 600m, Ivy Davidson finished third with 2mins 03.5secs and over the same distance her younger brother Luis made won his under nines race in 2mins 10secs and also finished second in his 80m race in 14.
3 seconds..
